Fuser Endless Belt Lateral Guide Meandering Control
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Solution Overview
Problem
Conventional fusers face challenges in effectively regulating the movement of an endless belt, leading to meandering issues which can cause damage and affect the thermal fusion process of developer images on recording media.
Innovation Solution
A fuser design incorporating a cylindrical member, an endless belt, pressing members, and a lateral guide with specific guide surfaces that contact the belt's lateral ends, forming nips and guiding the belt to prevent meandering, while allowing for efficient assembly and maintaining constant positional relationships.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Reliability
If conventional pressing members are used without lateral guides, then the structure is simpler, but the endless belt meanders and moves irregularly causing damage
Solution Approach 1:
A lateral guide is introduced as an intermediary component between the pressing members and the endless belt. The lateral guide contacts the lateral end of the endless belt and regulates its movement, preventing meandering while allowing the pressing members to maintain their primary function of forming the nip area.
Solution Approach 2:
The regulation function is segmented from the pressing members. Instead of requiring the pressing members to both form the nip and regulate belt movement, the lateral guide is added as a separate component that specifically handles the regulation function, allowing each component to optimize its primary function.
2Manufacturing precision
If the lateral guide is positioned to effectively regulate belt movement, then belt alignment is improved, but assembly becomes more complex
Solution Approach 1:
The lateral guide is pre-positioned and fixed to the pressing member before assembly. This preliminary positioning ensures that when the endless belt is installed, it automatically aligns correctly with the lateral guide, simplifying the overall assembly process while maintaining precise belt alignment.
Solution Approach 2:
The lateral guide is designed to automatically regulate the belt's lateral movement through its geometric configuration and contact point. The guide surface and positioning structure enable the system to self-align the belt without requiring complex external adjustment mechanisms.
Applied Scientific Principles
This section explains which scientific principles are used to turn an abstract innovation direction into a practical engineering solution.
Function Achieved in This Case
The solution effectively suppresses meandering of the endless belt, ensuring precise thermal fusion and improved assembly efficiency by maintaining the belt's alignment and reducing the risk of damage.
Implementation Method 1
a pressing member contacting an inner circumferential surface of the endless belt and sandwiching the endless belt together with the cylindrical member so as to form a first nip area; a pressing roller contacting the inner circumferential surface of the endless belt and sandwiching the endless belt together with the cylindrical member so as to form a second nip area
Implementation Method 2
a lateral guide including a guide surface contacting a lateral end of the endless belt
Implementation Method 3
a fuser which is configured to thermally fuse a developer image transferred to a recording medium
Data Source
AI summary
There is provided a fuser including: a cylindrical member; an endless belt; a pressing member; a pressing roller; and a lateral guide contacting a lateral end of the endless belt. A part of an outer circumferential surface of the pressing roller is located on a downstream of the second nip area in a first direction. A guide surface of the lateral guide has: a first guide surface located on an opposite side to the pressing roller with respect to a virtual plane including the center of a first nip area and the center of rotation of the cylindrical member, and a second guide surface located on a side of the pressing roller with respect to the virtual plane, located on the downstream side of the rotation axis of the pressing roller in the first direction, and arranged on a same plane as the first guide surface.